#WORLD #WORLDWIDE #CZECH #ANARCHISM #News #Journal #Update - (en) Czech, AFED: Anarchist sabotage in Russia - Interview with the Russian Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization (BOAK) on Final Straw Radio from mid-July (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 Could you briefly introduce yourself to begin with? ---- We consider ourselves

revolutionaries and fighters against Putin's authoritarian regime and all other
oppressors in Eastern Europe. We fight for a horizontal, self-governing society
based on solidarity, freedom, equality and radical ecology. We believe that
revolutionary organization is a necessary tool to achieve this goal, and we are
long-time participants in anarchist movements. We are members of the
Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization and the "Anarchist Warrior" collective of
information channels. ---- What is the Anarcho-Communist Fighting Organization?
What does it do, who participates in it, and what are its short-term and
long-term goals?
BOAK (Anarcho-Communist Struggle Organization) is a group of anarchists who
advocate direct action and guerrilla methods of struggle as the most appropriate,
though not the only, way to achieve social revolutionary goals, especially
against clearly authoritarian states such as today's Russia or Belarus.

Guerrilla struggle, like any other kind of revolutionary activity (including the
most "peaceful" and legal), should be conducted in an organized, disciplined and
radical manner. Anarchists need a political organization of committed
revolutionaries with fighting potential. The same is true of the wider opposition
movement in Russia and Belarus. During our activity, we try to realize this vision.

We can talk about our short-term and long-term goals. As short-term goals, we can
name the further development of our organization, the development of
communication with other organizations and groups, so that we become strong
enough to be able to make a difference in the medium-term goal - the instigation
of a social anarchist revolution in Russia. And our long-term goal is to complete
this revolution and build a new, free and just society according to our ideals.

How did you get into anarchist politics in a place where it is increasingly
criminalized and the leftist movement seems to have been all but wiped out? And
how do you respond to Western "anti-imperialists" who promote the Russian state
as a bulwark against imperialism?

We joined the anarchist movement several generations ago. Even before the current
harsh wave of repression, which has peaked since the end of 2017 until today.
Different members of our collective came to anarchist ideas in different ways.
But at some point, our militancy brought us together, and since then we have
continued to analyze and practice collectively.

Even if our movement is in danger of being criminalized or eradicated, it can
still attract new generations of revolutionaries to join it. A clear example is
the case of Kansk in Siberia, where the secret services prosecuted young boys who
became interested in militant anarchism. We believe that there are many of our
potential comrades all over the country, because anarchism has the aura of a
movement of consistent and determined fighters against the ruling regime.

We believe that all people with anti-imperialist views must understand that there
is more than one imperialist in the world. And Putin's Russia is definitely an
imperialist power that poses an even more immediate threat to the nations of the
region than, say, American imperialism (look at Kazakhstan this January or
Ukraine now).

Can you talk more about what your vision of social revolution is and how other
opposition movements that don't identify as anarchist might get involved?
Organizing in a repressive regime that criminalizes free speech and assembly
seems difficult.

In very general terms, a revolution is a process of fundamental political change
that takes place with the participation of broad social strata and takes place
outside existing legal procedures. In addition, social revolution means
significant social changes. It cannot be a mere exchange of ruling persons,
although any overthrow of the ruling cliques in Russia and Belarus for the time
being promises significant changes in our societies.

Of course, we would prefer these changes to have a libertarian trajectory. A
strong revolutionary organization is absolutely necessary for this. The overthrow
of authoritarian regimes in our countries will definitely be the task of a broad
popular movement, not of one political party or organization. Within this
movement, there is, as expected, fierce competition between different political
groups and their projects. If anarchists are serious about a libertarian
revolution, they must prepare to engage in this struggle.

We believe that, at least initially, there will be a coordination of very
different political initiatives united by a common goal. And in the process of
achieving this goal, the pros and cons of different ideologies and their
approaches will become apparent. And we hope that the anarchist ideology will be
the one that will respond to problems better than others and will give people the
opportunity to build a new society without the diseases of the old one.

Does Russia seem to be experiencing an upsurge in anarchist theory and politics,
or rather an increase in tactics and anti-state organizing unrelated to anarchism?

It would not really be correct to speak of any rise of anarchist theory in
Russia. In fact, it is in crisis and intensively looking for the light at the end
of the tunnel. However, such a situation, together with the dramatic historical
events we are witnessing, can bring new perspectives and understanding of how to
advance anarchist ideas and practice. Perhaps the libertarian idea of
confederation may gain some validity, since the bloody horror we are now
experiencing is a direct result of the oppressive and unjust social models of
Empire and the Nation State.

Did you form with the escalation of the war in Ukraine in February, or did the
group already exist before?

The group has been around for years, as has the "Anarchist Warrior" page and
channels. We have decided that the moment of truth, which is this war for our
region, is the right time to publicly announce the existence of the organization
and its name.

Because of the way the corporate news cycle works here in the US, news of
Russia's war in Ukraine doesn't get as much attention anymore. What stage is the
conflict in right now?

It is clear that the war is at a very hot, possibly pivotal point. A major battle
has been raging in the Donbas for several weeks, which seems to be at its peak.
Even if the corporate media in the West has begun to "forget" this war, it is no
less intense than in the first months and no less decisive for our region.

Is there an anti-war movement in the areas controlled by the Russian Federation?
We hear about censorship in the media, criminalization for calling it "war,"
brutal arrests of protesters in cities like Moscow and St. Petersburg. Is it
still going on, or has public protest been repelled by violence?

Yes, repression is reaching a high level. Censorship, arrests, torture and
imprisonment are commonplace. Louder and more massive protests in the first days
of the war in Russia were mostly suppressed by the government. However, there are
individual actions of a different kind, often by courageous artists or activists.
These still take place more or less regularly.

More important, it seems, was that another stream of resistance emerged soon
after the start of the war-spontaneous and decentralized acts of sabotage against
various government institutions, primarily against military recruitment centers.
It has already become a phenomenon and we hope that it will soon take on more
organized, mass and radical forms.

As you know, we are also trying to contribute to this part of the fight.

Let's assume that our listeners did not notice the news about the actions against
the repressive regimes in Belarus and Russia. Can you talk about some of the
actions of individual artists and activists that inspire you? What about action
against recruitment centers? What do they look like, how many have taken place
and how do residents react to them?

Direct actions against an oppressive regime have a very long history in our
countries.

Starting with the NRA (New Revolutionary Alternative), which destroyed the main
FSB building in 1999 along with several military recruitment centers. Later there
was the "Black Bloc" which organized an anarchist guerrilla group for several
years and was never caught. Mikhail Zlobitsky, who attacked the FSB building in
Arkhangelsk, paid with his life. Or the four anarchists who returned to Belarus
in 2020 to fight Lukashenko's oppression, convicted in the "Anarchist Partisans"
case. And so on and so forth. We can clearly see that resistance has always been
there.

But now that the tyrannical nature of Putin's regime is obvious to everyone,
direct action has become the method of a very wide range of people. In recent
months, there have been 18 burnings of military recruitment centers across
Russia. Not all were successful - sometimes the fire was too small. But in
several cases - for example in Mordovia - the documents of young people who would
have to go to the army were destroyed. In Nižnevartovsk, Luhovice, Omsk, some
rooms of military centers burned down.

As we have already mentioned, direct action has become the method of
non-activists. This led to a few arrests at first, but they are learning very
quickly, so now there have been almost no arrests in recent events. People's
reactions are different, for example some succumb to military propaganda. But
many of them understand that this war will lead to the death of many people,
including their sons and husbands, who would be sent to Ukraine to die in Putin's
war.

In addition to lighting recruitment centers, other events are also taking place.
For example, there have been several cases of train derailments or attacks on
railway electrical equipment and mobile phone towers in border areas.

How do you support other groups or individuals whose actions you are affiliated with?

We support all people of good will who are participating in the current fierce
conflict on the side of the freedom struggle. All who oppose the Putin and
Lukashenko regimes, especially those who do so inside these countries. We also
support all anarchist and other anti-authoritarian revolutionaries fighting for
freedom and justice around the world.

In terms of concrete steps, we use our info channels both to share skills useful
for direct actions and to disseminate information about various groups that send
us messages and communiques about their actions. After the outbreak of war, we
also started collecting donations to support various revolutionaries and groups
that need funding for their activities. Based on trust, we have already sent the
first small "scholarships" upon request.

Could you tell us more about these feeds? Individuals face fines and other
penalties for participating in allegedly private Telegram chats related to
protests, direct actions and solidarity. Since we know that Telegram is not a
secure platform, how to avoid surveillance by the Russian and Belarusian state?
How did you address the need for a safety culture while promoting a culture of
resistance?

We started our propaganda activity with the bo-ak.org website. But we understand
that today people use social networks more often to get information, so to reach
a larger audience, we also set up several social accounts - on vk.com (Russian
social network), telegram, twitter, youtube, etc.

Some of our channels were banned and others didn't have much success (and we were
also forced to move our website to the darknet), so now we write on these platforms:
* boakor7dmr63zguccltp6nki56ou4oppirhyllfck7yd3sifywinhkyd.onion/ - our main
page. You will find there mostly theoretical articles, in addition to our most
important news and announcements about our events.
* http://boakmirror.noblogs.org/ - is a mirror of sites that are not on the dark web.
* https://t.me/BO_AK_reborn - is our main Telegram channel. Here we publish
useful advice on how to organize direct actions, our ideological articles,
resistance reports and communiques about our actions.
* https://vk.com/bo_ak and https://vk.com/zloyancom - our channels on vk.com.

About Security: Vk is the least secure platform of all. It's a shame because a
lot of people still use it, so we post our top news there so we don't lose them.
However, we do not establish contacts and we strongly recommend everyone to stop
communicating on vk and at least switch to Telegram. Of course, it is also not
absolutely safe. So our method is to use burner phones (and preferably
anonymously use virtual numbers bought with cryptocurrencies). We also recommend
using Telegram only through TOR or VPN. Never trust anyone on the internet, never
give anyone information about yourself that you don't want the police to get
into. And we recommend this approach to our readers whenever we can.

We also use and suggest others to use pgp encrypted e-mail for important
dialogues. We believe it's more secure than Telegram - at least you only have to
worry about the person on the other end of the conversation and not the channel
carrying it.

One of our earlier guests from Russia mentioned that many Russians avoid
conscription, so soldiers from neighboring Central Asian countries dependent on
Russian trade and goods are often used. Who is generally fighting in Ukraine in
the Russian army?

We can roughly distinguish two groups in the Russian occupation forces. The first
are the real "dogs of war", Wagner fighters, various elite units and contract
soldiers for whom war is a way of life. They are largely indoctrinated by the
chauvinist reactionary ideology of the regime. The second group are soldiers who
still signed the contract voluntarily, but were recruited in poor, economically
backward regions, where military service is one of the few possibilities for
social advancement. These people are also victims of the imperialist ambitions of
Putin's clique. It is no coincidence that these boys often come from Russian
"internal colonies" or so-called national republics, underdeveloped and robbed by
the center, from places like Buryatia, Dagestan and others.

This is the first time we hear about foreigners from Central Asia in the Russian
army, and it sounds unlikely. We should not confuse them with soldiers from the
national regions of the Russian Federation. There was also a report some time ago
that Russia is recruiting troops in Syria, but we have not seen any proof of this.

How do the sanctions affect ordinary people? Can you comment on the relationship
between state rhetoric about Russian capitalist self-sufficiency and the reality
of climate change (drought affecting food production, etc.)?

The effects of sanctions do not reach ordinary people quickly. At first it may
seem that everything is fine. But then you go to the store and see that some
products you need (and not some luxury things) cost three times what they were
before, and you can't buy other things at all.

You can see that people in Russia are starting to suffer from the sanctions, but
so far there is more anger in the air, people are asking, "Why is everything so
expensive?" Most of them still think that somehow things can go back to normal
(even if they don't have idea how exactly). So the government is not feeling any
resistance yet.

But the situation is changing every day.

As for whether Russia could become self-sufficient, our answer is: "No way under
the current regime." It couldn't without sanctions, with such high oil prices and
a surplus of money - so the chances of it will succeed now is zero. Perhaps
Russian society could become more self-sufficient if it engaged in bottom-up
participatory economic approaches.

Under the current system, Russia can cover some of its food or clothing needs.
But something more complex - electronics, cars, machines - probably not. One
could try to buy them from China or through other countries (so-called gray
imports). However, Russia is very vast and needs many different things. We don't
think gray imports can cover everything. And, of course, time is of the essence
here too - the warehouses are no longer full and Russia does not have years to
build business chains.

So we believe that very soon people in Russia will feel the shortage again, even
more strongly than in the days of the Soviet Union.

How does increasing evidence of state repression move people from pro-war or
neutral to anti-war positions? Or is that not happening? If so, does state
propaganda evolve in response to these shifts, or does it simply rely on fear to
maintain control?

It seems to us that there is not much progress in propaganda in Russia. Even
after the events in Bucha, Ukraine, were clarified, Russia took the position that
"these are all lies, our soldiers are saints." And unfortunately, many people
prefer to believe that. Because if you don't believe that, then something needs
to be done because "your" state is pure evil. And it's a very scary thing to do
in times like these.

It's sad, but the evidence of state repression alone has so far failed to move
the masses in Russia to an anti-war stance. Especially when the propaganda
machine works so hard to say "it's all a lie".

But it works together with other facts - that your quality of life is worse than
before, that your son came back from war dead (or worse - he didn't come home at
all, and the authorities pretend they don't know anything and just want you to
they left). And all of that together can really change people's attitudes.

I think there are assumptions in the US and elsewhere that if Putin leaves office
or is removed (as Joe Biden threatened at one point), Russia may join the happy
menagerie of liberal capitalist republics. Can you talk about what a "strongman
exchange" might mean if there was no social revolution in Russia or Belarus?

A "strongman change" in Russia can occur in very different contexts. In the worst
case, it will only be an internal exchange of people in power within the ruling
clique, and the system will hardly change (which in turn could trigger another
rebellion). Another option is to overthrow the ruling elite or at least change
its course in one way or another. In the post-Soviet period, we saw in the case
of President Yeltsin that liberal economic policies can easily be combined with
rather autocratic political actions. A new, more "liberal" leader, whether from
the current establishment or the opposition, would hardly guarantee a real
socio-political shift.

Real changes do not require "strongman change" but liberation from all such.
Introduction of the practice of self-government. However, a certain "transitional
period" cannot be ruled out, when a change of government can cause a general
weakening of the state and give room for further social changes. Libertarian
revolutionaries must be prepared to capture the widest possible social base at
this time.

In any case, there is no place for Russia in the "Western world" if only because
global elites and global market conditions do not allow for any mass welfare
outside the zone of the global metropolis. Russian society is thus inevitably
faced with the challenge of finding ways to its prosperity outside the false
recipes proposed by the "happy menagerie of liberal capitalist republics".

As for Belarus - its current political system seems to be even more dependent on
a single person than Russia's. If Lukashenko were to leave the country, Belarus
would experience either an attempt at complete absorption by Russian imperialists
or a path of intense change along an unpredictable trajectory.

In the last decade, we have seen disinformation polarizing families and
communities in the US. Are you witnessing similar effects around the difference
between "a special operation to take out the Nazis and liberate our little
brothers in the Ukraine" versus "an imperialist invasion to rebuild the lost
empire"? Are there strategies to deal with the effect of state propaganda on an
interpersonal level (so that the dissonance does not become toxic and
insurmountable)? Also, is it a lever of state power to maintain interpersonal
conflicts by involving state services as in Soviet times?

Yes, in Russia and neighboring countries it is similar both in families and in
circles of friends. Perhaps it can be said that older generations are sometimes
more willing to follow the regime's agenda (with countless exceptions, of
course). We believe that this should be faced on a human level - all consumers of
state propaganda should see for themselves that the people who reject it are
their loved ones, and not some evil TV portrayal. If you defend your position
calmly, with good arguments, a friendly attitude and finally with love, you have
a good chance of being heard.

How can listeners outside of Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine act and communicate in
solidarity with the resistance movements against Lukashenko, Putin, and the war
in Ukraine? How can we support those who take direct action and those who have
been criminalized? And how can we stay informed?

Direct action against authoritarian regimes in Eastern Europe can be undertaken
worldwide. We are very inspired by the occupations carried out by Western friends
in the houses of Russian oligarchs. All their business interests, assets and
Western partners are legitimate targets in this context. All public symbolic
actions of solidarity are also very welcome. Any speech is important, inspiring
and invaluable.

Last but not least is the flow of information. We ask friends to spread our words
in their surroundings. In particular, it is necessary to fight against the
Kremlin nonsense about the "anti-fascist struggle against Ukrainian Nazis and
NATO". Donation campaigns and collections of material aid for libertine
structures in Eastern Europe are also a really important basis for the
sustainability of our struggle.

We would recommend some information sources that have more or less regular
updates in English: avtonom.org for Russia; Resistance Committee for Ukraine and
Pramen for Belarus. We, as an Anarcho-Communist Struggle Organization, also try
to translate key messages and texts into English.

ttps://www.afed.cz/text/7708/anarchisticke-sabotaze-v-rusku
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